Today’s Readings – Tuesday of Week 14 of Ordinary Time - First Reading

Commentary on Genesis 32:23-33

We jump a few chapters in our story of Jacob and come to an experience even more strange than the vision of the ladder/staircase going up to heaven. Jacob has been preparing to meet with his estranged brother Esau. He was not at all sure what kind of meeting it was going to be with the brother whom he had cheated out of his birth-right. Each one was now rich and powerful in his own domain.

As our reading opens we are told that Jacob takes his two wives (Rachel and Leah), his two slave-girls and his 11 children (the youngest, Benjamin, has been conceived but not born), together with all his possessions, across the River Jabbok to a safer place while he stays behind alone.

‘Jabbok’ is possibly a play on ‘Jacob’. (The author loves toying with na … Continue

Yesterday’s Readings – Monday of Week 14 of Ordinary Time - First Reading

Commentary on Genesis 28:10-22

Today and tomorrow we read of two strange experiences which Jacob has. On the way from Beersheba to Haran, Jacob stops for the night. Haran, we may remember, was the place between Ur and Canaan where Abraham lived before moving down to Canaan. It was ther … Continue